


Lost When We Aren't Together

by bracus09



Category: SEAL Team (TV)
Genre: Gen, Injury, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-29
Updated: 2019-12-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 03:41:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,921
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22010500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bracus09/pseuds/bracus09
Summary: When two brothers are injured, they will go to great lengths to find each other.
Comments: 15
Kudos: 104





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Doing an experiment on trying to write viewpoints. Let me know what you think.
> 
> Also, thank you lauren2381 for beta-ing and helping me smooth out the rough edges.
> 
> Enjoy!

The room was private: one chair for visitors, one lamp on the nightstand, one window facing a dark parking lot and one call button.

One bed.

He stared half-mast into the dark and thought he could still taste stale water and the metallic tang of blood that had mingled in with the water. For a while, he thought for sure he was going to drown with the taste of his teammate’s blood in his mouth. The few coughs he tried wouldn’t banish it completely.

Hospital beds weren’t made for comfort, but it was still a relief to lean into the thick, cushioned surface anyway and ease the strain off his right hip. He’d refused several offers of a sedative. He preferred to be alert in case of news – good or bad. But it also meant the initial relief the hospital bed gave him deteriorated to growing misery. And being in this room didn’t help matters.

The make-shift stretcher he had been carried out on was meant to keep him somewhat immobile, but it also rendered him blind to where Alpha team carried out his brother. When he was placed on one helo and his teammate placed on the second helo, it prevented him from seeing how injured he was and where he went when they entered the hospital. All he knew before he was wheeled up to Orthopedics was that an OR had been set up for his friend.

But that was all he knew. Jason, Ray, Trent and Brock were all called back onto base for debrief leaving them both separated somewhere in this hospital. 

He sank bank into the pillows that were generously piled and fluffed up for him; fluffed up because he could have died, fluffed up because people were glad, he didn’t. While he appreciated the attention, what he really wanted was more news and all anyone around here would tell him was that everyone was fine.

Great. Awesome. That was as useful as a screen door on a submarine. He didn’t give a rat’s ass that everyone was fine, he wanted information on his brother!

He chewed his lower lip, absently scratched a spot above his eyebrow and thought about the wide eyes that had stared down at him, silently pleading with him not to die. He thought of the blood that came trickling down and how the other man’s arms shook trying to help keep his head above water. Wet wood and the ozone-tainted air soured with the coppery bite of blood.

He cleared his throat, but blood leaves an aftertaste that stays in the back of the throat and never quite goes away. Especially, if it was from a friend, a teammate, a brother.

The bed creaked as he eased himself down a little lower. He coughed and probably would for a while because the water he had swallowed had been filthy.

Even with the lights off, the hallway outside the door quiet, he couldn’t get his eyes to close. He ignored the call button the well-meaning nurse had slipped into his hand. A sedative wouldn’t help. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath and let it escape slowly.

Blood dripped down on his face.

His eyes flew open and he was back in the hospital again, not the arms dealer’s house in Romania.

He looked to his left, to his right.

Still only one bed.

Nope.

This wouldn’t do at all.

With a groan that he didn’t bother to stifle – there was no one here to hear it – he grabbed a hospital robe, his crutches and hobbled out of his room.

***

Someone was snoring.

That much he could figure when he was finally able to peel back the layers of haze that wrapped around him like a blanket. He opened his gritty eyes, blearily looking at the pillow his chin rested on, listening to the unfamiliar sounds.

It hurt too much to lift his head up because it would pull at the twenty-three stitches the doctor had sewn up across his shoulders. Besides, moving also meant using the back muscles currently crisscrossed with stitches on his lower back, too. The doctor didn’t tell him how many stitches those took. The damn doctor doped him up and sent him up to the OR for those.

Carefully, he lifted his head off the pillow inch by inch. Even though he was still fuzzy from whatever they gave him, his tongue furry from the anesthesia, he was alert enough to remind himself to be careful not to use anything but his elbows to prop his upper torso up. Lying on his belly hurt less but it also made it harder to move. It took a few seconds after he was done to blink away the pain-induced tears from his vision.

A bald man, sheets pulled up to his nose, wheezed and snorted in the bed to his left with all the sounds of a car sputtering like it was running out of gas. The man looked like a hill, his gut a round lump under the sheets that jiggled as he snored. Every so often, he coughed, scratched his ear and went right back to the noise he was making.

That was not his brother.

There was a cold slither, wiggly like a snake that crawled in and settled inside his gut.

The doctor said his teammate was okay. The femoral artery in his leg wasn’t cut. It wasn’t that. The blood in the water and the cold clammy skin was from the beginnings of hypothermia and a gash on the right calf, not because he was bleeding to death. His brother hadn’t bled to death because he couldn’t get one crummy boiler off him. No, he was told the other man was fine.

Told.

Because by the time Trent reported he’d cut through the boiler and his brother was freed, he had folded over and Ray had caught him. Sort of. They both fell into the water. Bet Ray was sore about getting wet.

So… he was okay. They wouldn’t lie to him. Right? Two doctors assured him that his teammate was fine. Jason too – well, sort of. His team leader pushed him back down on the bed, told him to stop asking and pointed out that if his brother wasn’t fine, would they be here, wasting precious time trying to tell him otherwise?

He scowled. Jason always did have a rotten bedside manner when he finds out his guys are fine.

He surveyed the room as best he could. 

Nope.

Two beds here with one of them occupied by a stranger.

Whose dumb idea was that?

With a whimper that he swallowed back, he held the bedrails and eased him off the bed and into the wheelchair that stood between their beds. His roommate drowned out the squeak of the wheels so when the door opened, and the wheelchair bumped the wall and he groaned; the old man never stirred.

***

The people on the seventh floor who glanced his way as he limped by weren’t familiar, so he dismissed them as unimportant. He concentrated more on the blurry room numbers and on planting his crutches firmly on the floor so he could swing forward his right leg, which wasn’t easy with his leg casted from knee to foot. Who the fuck knew that fiberglass turned out to be surprisingly heavy?

It was good to feel dry again though. The water that had surrounded him before was cold, gritty and oily from grease, silt and just a mess of a lot of things that came spilling out of the kitchen and into the water below. The fucking arms dealers were nuttier than a squirrel turd! They stupidly placed explosives in an unstable area and all it took was one stray bullet and boom! Parts of floor of the kitchen fell away into the basement underneath. What didn’t help was the explosion caused the watermain into the house to break and the basement started to flood.

The hospital gown was thin but still warm enough paired with a robe. He squinted at one room number before grimacing and shuffled to the next. Then to the next one. It didn’t seem like it was that far away when he initially got the room number from a very sympathetic nurse. He had scowled when she told him, his face darkened enough that she’d backed away and looked tempted to call for an orderly. It wasn’t her fault, he told himself as he limped towards the elevator. The explosion at the house had created a huge mess for the mission and having Alpha team with them had helped them secure the weapons and the arms dealers.

But all the way up on the seventh floor? Whose bright idea was that?

With visiting hours over, the hospital was quiet. Then again, after all the shouting, explosions and bullets flying, his teammate’s pleas, the roar of the water rising higher and higher above his ears, anything else would be whisper quiet. But now it was too quiet. He’d grown too accustomed to the white noise of everyone chatting as they prepped for the mission, small talking on the drive over. The grunted responses when days were rough, the laughter on days that were good. Anything else hurt his ears.

His eyes brightened when he sighted the room number before him.

722.

At last. Seeing that number made him happier than a tornado in a trailer park.

He’d almost walked by it in a daze. He staggered closer and with a shoulder, nudged the door open to reveal twin beds. There was a man sleeping, snoring, which stuttered when light from the doorway crossed his face.

“W-what? W-who?” An unfamiliar lined face scrunched up with annoyance and lifted up to glare sleepily at him.

“Sorry,” he offered in a raspy voice. He eyed the empty bed next to the man. “Wrong room.” He shut the door just as the patient inside grumbled something about his wheelchair. He leaned against the wall. A nurse walked by and gave him a curious look that he returned with a shaky smile.

Shit. Now what?

***

He nearly passed out in the elevator.

Okay, that wasn’t good.

He made a note not to reach, stretch or strain for anything anymore. Trying not to breathe might be a good idea, too.

His arms shook as he reached back and down for the wheels to propel himself out of the elevator car onto the third floor. He rolled past the waiting area and down the hallway.

As he wheeled towards his destination, he thought he could still feel the glass and metal raining down on his back from the sagging, buckling kitchen floor. Some had felt like nothing, others felt like they stuck him in all sorts of places. But nothing hurt more than the realization that help might arrive too late for his teammate that barely keeping his head above the water that was flooding in.

Water had rose higher and higher with each minute, despite reaching out and grabbing the straps of his tac vest to keep his head above water. The water was creeping up past the chin, the ears, the mouth. He couldn’t stop his brother from being submerged by the water, and he could only continue to hold the other man’s vest to help raise his head above the surface with both hands until the rest of Bravo and Alpha finally got the fire fight under control and rounded up the arms dealer.

It wasn’t until they finally got their teammate up and out of the water did, they realize the blood in the water was from two men, not one.

The wheelchair halted at one corner because, suddenly, he was back in the house, his heart hammering in his chest, his arms shaking as he tried to prevent his brother from drowning. He pulled so hard on his vest, he thought that he could have ripped the Velcro apart. But it was better than the alternative: calling in a Fallen Eagle, sitting on the back of a C-17 staring at a flag covered box – 

It didn’t happen, he told himself as he took a deliberate slow breath. In. Out. In. Out.

It. Didn’t. Happen.

The vise around his chest loosened a fraction and he sighted the room he was looking for. His mouth quirked; he could only imagine what his brother would have to say when he rolled in.

“Rise and shine,” he began in as loud and steady of a voice he could muster. He kicked open the door into the private room. “Just wanted to – “

Empty.

The wheelchair slowed to a stop at the foot of the bed. He blinked at the rumpled covers. Tentatively, he gave the bed a nudge.

Okay, that didn’t go according to plan.

***

His brother had sworn worse than a drunken sailor. The water crashed over them, pounding relentlessly and soon he found himself staring up at a watery, gritty image of his brother. Hands had a firm grip on his vest straps, jerking his upper body up above the water then he swore when part of the ceiling fan dropped. Unintentionally, his brother let go of his vest as his upper torso jerked and he found himself back in the water, air bubbles clouding the look of panic he saw as he fell back.

He resurfaced coughing, blood dribbling down from his teammate’s back onto his face. His brother’s hands clasped on his vest once again. He could feel his limbs shake with strain; a human body was never meant to contort and hold positions in such punishing conditions for so long. He stared up at his friend, wincing with him as more debris fell from the destroyed kitchen above them and slammed into a bowed back.

He told him to get out of here.

His brother had replied to shut the hell up.

That idiot got the sense God gave an ant. Which is none.

He leaned forward into his crutches and stared at the elevator down the end of a bone-achingly long corridor. He grimaced because he knew his brother was probably out there wandering as well.

It would make more sense, he reasoned, to go back to his room and wait for his other half there; better than both roving around. It would be like searching the hillside at midnight without your NODs.

Logical. Reasonable. He just needed to go back down to the 3rd floor, back to his room and wait.

Nope. No one has ever called him logical or reasonable.

He thought he could still hear water sloshing in his ears as his ears as he maneuvered around and hobbled towards the elevator again. He set his jaw, nodded at the orderly who stuck his foot out to hold the elevator doors and balanced on his left foot as he punched for the sixth floor.

Hang on, he though and his mouth curved at the unintentional echo.

I’m coming. Even if it takes until the cows come home.

***

Maybe it was 417?

He screwed up his face as he shifted his weight in order to turn the wheelchair around to steer back towards the elevator. He bobbed his head absently as nurses chimed in greeting, but he was determined to continue his mission. His eyes were focused on the floor because if he looked up to see how far he still has to go; he might really pass out.

The elevator display on top indicated it was going down and stalled at six. Even though it wouldn’t do any good, he jammed a thumb at the ‘up’ button again. He sucked in his breath when something on his lower back burned.

It burned like that after something hard broke off from above them and came spinning down towards them. He didn’t see it, but his teammate’s eyes told him enough. They’d widened at something behind him and suddenly, hands that were holding on to his own forearms now splashed towards him, to try to shove him off. It was like a rodeo, trying to stay on a horse that wanted to buck you off. He tensed his shoulder, hunched forward and swallowed the scream when he felt it bounce off his back with hot accuracy and knocked his tactical helmet off. He knew it was bad when he saw his own blood trickling around from his back and dispersed into pink spidery lines in the water below.

His brother made jerky gestures telling him to go. He ignored it because the water was now rising past his friend’s nose. There was no diving gear; the mission was on dry land, so he held up the other man the best he could.

The elevator finally arrived, and he rolled into the car, alone. There was no one to hear his groan when he reached and punched the ‘four’ button. Oh yeah, that’s right: no more straining, stretching or reaching. Oops.

He rested his head against the back of the chair and took a steadying breath as he tried to ignore the fact that the walls were closing in and he thought he could feel water splashing over him. He shivered. The water had been cold; cold enough that his teammate’s fingers that clasped at his wrist had started turning blue. 

When the elevator dinged its arrival, he shook his head furiously, rattled the taste of water out of his mouth. He pushed forward in his chair harder than necessary. The wheels bounced as they coasted over the tiny gap made by the elevator car and the fourth floor. The tiny jolt ignited the careful stitching on his back. He accidentally rolled into a potted fern by the vending machines before his vision cleared.

Just a little bit more, he had told himself then. He’d grasped the faint sounds of Brock and Trent trying to clear a way to the two teammates under the backdrop of Ray and Jason both hollering into coms to hold on. Just a little bit more, a few more minutes, get his head up a few more inches – but he didn’t dare give himself an estimate – and they would get his brother out from under the boiler, out of the flooding basement.

Just a little bit more, he repeated in his head right now as he zeroed in on 417 up ahead. His jaw set, his shoulders stuff, he urged his wheelchair to travel a few more feet. Just a bit more… reach for the knob…

Empty.

“Aw man,” he breathed. He rested his head on the door jam and swallowed back the urge to vomit. Ironically, his legs shook even though he hadn’t been walking. Lifting up his head, he stared with burning eyes down the passage he had just traveled down.

Maybe it was 517?

***

Brock told him he looked like a drowned cat.

The burly SEALs hauled him up easily from under the basement once the firefight was over and they got the boiler off him. In no amount of time, he was on a stretcher. Then, with a smile that might have been a frown, Trent told him he looked like a sorry wreck.

Then his brother crumbled, toppled against Ray like a felled tree without so much as a sound or warning. Ray yelped, twisted around to catch their collapsing teammate, only to end up in the dirty water, completely soaked.

That was the last time as he saw his brother as Alpha team was carrying him to the helo and Trent focused on their other teammate. Alpha took off in the first helo and the rest of Bravo were going to take the second one.

He rested against the archway for the waiting room on the fifth floor. Sixth was pointless. No one was at the CCU wards and he didn’t dare ask anyone because it may just earn him an escort back down to three.

This was dumb, he thought as he sat gingerly on a chair to rest his throbbing leg. This run around was making him madder than a wet hen.

So, he hasn’t seen his brother. So what? They told him he was fine, that he was alive. That should be enough. Except the increasingly tight knot in his chest said it wasn’t, like a cord of rope, it squeezed around his ribs, shrinking around him the longer he looked, the longer he remembered.

“Idiot,” he whispered to himself and got a dirty look from a disheveled man in the chair next to him. He offered a wan smile that received only a grunt in return. He sighed and stared glumly at the empty chairs in the waiting area. Somehow, seeing all those chairs made his eyes burn. They looked forlorn. He gingerly eased himself into one of the chairs and propped his crutches on an empty seat next to him. 

He’d told him to get out there, that he didn’t need his brother to shield him from the debris above.

The right leg twinged. He rubbed his hands over his knees and grimaced. He swallowed convulsively and rubbed his palms deeper into his thighs to massage the aches out. He needed to get up. Maybe the fourth floor? Maybe… damn it, maybe he should convince a nurse to page his teammate.

“H-hey,” He heard.

The coil around his chest loosened at the whispered syllable and he let out his breath in a whoosh. His hands stilled and he turned a heavy head towards the newly arrived wheelchair that had crept up on his left unnoticed until now. Experience has him automatically scanning from feet and upwards, his stomach unclenching more and more when he reached the face.

His mouth crinkled to a smile that mirrored the other man’s.

“Clay,” he croaked.


	2. Chapter 2

His arms were already steering the chair for the waiting room while his mind was still trying to catch up, still puzzling over why he was heading for the bowed head in the waiting room, barely visible through the chicken-wired window.

Seeing Sonny slumped in the chair, crutches next to him, staring at his hospital sock-slippers made him lightheaded. And Clay couldn’t think of anything to say. He sat there for a few seconds, unnoticed, drinking in the bandages on Sonny’s leg, the flushed pallor on his face and the steady rise and fall of his Sonny’s chest, breathing. 

“H-hey,” Clay whispered finally.

Sonny looked up and his eyes, once dull with pain before, were now light with relief. He studied Clay, opened his mouth, closed it and tried again.

“Blondie,” Blue eyes flicked up and down. A smiled quirked. “You look terrible.”

There were a lot of things Clay wanted to say in return. A whole bunch in fact but the only thing that crawled out of his dry throat was, “You weren’t in your room.”

An eyebrow rose high. “You weren’t either, Goldilocks.” Sonny responded hoarsely.

Clay scoffed and even though it made the stitches on the back of his shoulders sting, it felt good to be talking to someone.

Sonny reached over and guided Clay’s chair closer by gripping the armrests. He left his hands on them, knees touching – well, one knee, the right leg was forced to stretch out to the side between them.

“Hey, Poster Boy,” Sonny rasped.

Clay couldn’t help but grin. “Hey yourself.” He nodded towards him. “Heard it wasn’t the femoral.”

Sonny mimicked Clay. “Heard it was fifty-six stitches.”

Clay rose an eyebrow. “Was it? Total?”

Sonny’s brow knitted; eye narrowed. “Total? Where else did you need stitches?”

Clay clamped his mouth shut. He sat back carefully into the seat and offered Sonny a grin. It was easier to smile with Sonny sitting there, alive, in front of him.

“Everyone left?” Clay asked quickly when he realized Sonny was giving him a considering look.

“Went back to base for debrief,” Sonny’s mouth pursed. “Should you even be up, Peter Pan?”

“Should you?” Clay countered. “You have a cast.”

“You have fifty-six stitches,” Sonny shot back. “At least.”

They grinned at each other and Clay gave a half-hearted slap on Sonny’s left knee. Sonny looked down, grunted then leaned back. He folded his arms and studied Clay.

“I’m alright,” Clay promised. Hell, he was feeling better and better already.

Sonny’s face contorted as if trying to hold back but the words tumbled out anyway. “You should have left. Waited until it was safe. Not stay in the wide open to possibly become target practice and become a human shield.”

“Huh?” Clay scrunched up his face.

Sonny swatted towards his head but made no effort to connect. “You know what I mean.” He exhaled and sat back in the chair.

Clay shrugged. Ouch. Okay. Big mistake. “You can’t tell me you wouldn’t do the same.” He eyed Sonny warily. “Right?”

The swat this time connected to the back of his head and it was the answer he needed. Clay exhaled and scratched his beard with a finger.

“If any of that stuff had been sharper or gone in deeper…” Blue eyes darkened to flints as Sonny’s thoughts turned inwards. “It could have cut into your spine, Princess.”

“None of it was,” Clay pointed out. “You know… deeper… or sharper. You told me once never to dwell on the if’s, Sonny.”

“Well that was different,” Sonny muttered but he didn’t explain. He lifted his gaze at Clay. “Thanks.” Sonny shook his head slowly. “But you’re still an idiot.”

Clay’s smile flipped. “You’re welcome.”

“Don’t ever do that again, Young Jedi,” Sonny warned.

Clay rolled his eyes. “Sure, Sonny. If you don’t fall through a collapsed floor and get trapped under a boiler and nearly drown in two feet of water, I won’t try to save your life again.”

The rubber tip of a crutch nudged his chair. “Boss said it was barely ten inches.”

“Yeah,” Clay felt himself sagging, his limbs pulling him deeper into his seat. “Well, it felt like two feet,” Clay gulped. “Felt like a lot of water.” He rubbed his eyes wearily with the back of a hand and blinked fuzzily at the IV port taped to his forearm. Where did that come from?

“You weren’t in your room,” Clay yawned as he lowered his arm before Sonny could see it.

Sonny cocked his head. “You already said that, Tinkerbell.”

Did he? Clay shifted in his seat. He wished leaning back or forward would ease the lump in his gut. “Everyone kept telling me you were fine.”

A shadow crossed Sonny’s face. “Same here.” He tapped Clay’s right knee. “But that’s all they would say.” He gave Clay a crooked grin. “Saw your roommate.” His smile faded at Clay’s blank look. “Uh… 722?”

Clay flipped through his memory like a box of pictures. “Oh. Him.” He looked down ruefully at his lap. “He asked about his chair?”

“I think there was some choice words about it when I came knocking.” Sonny chuckled. “Actually, there’s probably some people right now with a few choice words about us,” Sonny grabbed his crutches. “Come on, let’s get you back upstairs.”

Clay frowned as he watched Sonny try to get up and fail. “Downstairs first. It’s closer.”

Sonny huffed even as he shifted closer to Clay and tried to use the armrests to push off. “Closer? I’m on the third floor, you’re on the seventh. We’re exactly in the middle. Upstairs.”

Clay gulped. Wow, when did that hot poker get shoved down his back? That little ache he had been ignoring returned with all the intensity of an outgunned firefight. It didn’t feel like he was sitting anymore. It felt like he was lying on a bed of needles.

“Downstairs is closer,” Clay insisted anyway. He puffed between his teeth. Clay dropped his head to his chin so Sonny couldn’t see his grimace as he offered Sonny a hand and pulled him to his feet.

The crutches banged against Clay as Sonny struggled to slip them under his arm. “Look, we’ll just go upstairs, It’s just two flights up –“

“Exactly. Up, Sonny. Up.” Clay stated through gritted teeth.

“I shouldn’t ask but… What are you talking about?” Sonny asked.

Clay tried to laugh but his tongue was stuck on the roof of his mouth. It occurred to him maybe that IV had something important for him because his lower back was boiling.

“Gravity,” Clay managed as he trailed behind Sonny and kept an eye on the cast clopping clumsily on the floor. A few orderlies had to get out of Sonny’s way. “We go up, we’re going against gravity.”

The crutches halted. Sonny nearly fell sideways when he turned around. “Gravity?” He rolled his eyes. “Going downstairs just means gravity’s pulling you down.”

“Exactly,” Clay wheezed as the pair made a stuttering turn around a corner that was neither graceful nor pretty to look at. A nurse with a cart nearly ran into Sonny then nearly got run over by Clay. Sonny nearly planted a crutch on another nurse’s foot. Clay flashed her a smile before she could call an orderly on them. He wheeled closer, so Sonny could use his handlebars. Clay grabbed the left crutch and tracked Sonny’s wobbly progress. “Less work letting gravity pull you down.”

“Our injuries are because I fell through the floor and that’s because gravity was pulling me down through a hole in the floor.” Sonny reminded him. He grabbed hold of Clay’s right handle. Between that and the one crutch, he was steadier. Kind of. Sort of. Well, he wasn’t running into anything at least. Or anyone.

“Besides, what work? We’re using the elevator,” Sonny argued.

Clay stopped because Sonny was starting to sound breathless. He watched Sonny lean on the wall next to a door. He inched his chair closer, against Sonny’s good leg. Just in case.

“We should get you back upstairs first,” Sonny was still saying. “I’m sure your roommate misses you.”

Clay toed the floor with his left slipper sock and wondered when he’d lost the right one. “He snores,” Clay grumbled.

“I heard. I think all of the seventh floor heard, in fact.” Came Sonny’s dry response.

The wheelchair rocked back and forth a little. He really didn’t want to go back to that room even though now the cold lump that had been rolling in his gut was thawing. Clay shifted in his seat and flinched when his back pulled.

A hand touched his left shoulder. “Hey.”

Bile rolled in his throat. “I think…” Clay managed, “I think I need to sit down, Sonny.”

“You already are, Clay Boy.” Sonny edged closer to Clay. His hands moved to brace both of his shoulders. “You’re sitting on a stolen wheelchair, remember?”

“Oh…” Clay swallowed, “Then I think I need to lie down, Sonny.”

Sonny craned his neck to look for a nurse. “Let me get you some help back upstairs.” He made a sound. “Where did everyone go? Come on.” Sonny’s hands on his shoulders tightened. “If I give you my crutches, think you can hold them?”

“Yeah,” Clay gasped out. He accepted the crutches and rested his cheek on the cool supports.

A hand rested on top of his head briefly before moving back to the handlebars. The wheelchair falteringly began to move under Sonny’s urging.

“You shouldn’t have left your room,” Sonny said hoarsely.

Clay grunted. He wanted to retort something about a pot, a kettle, but for some reason, he couldn’t remember how the saying went. He could feel Sonny stumbling to walk behind his chair. He frowned, tempted to wave a nurse down, get a chair for Sonny as well. He squinted at the time and made a face. No wonder the place looked deserted. He sat there and tried to breathe slowly as Sonny quietly urged him as they walked – well, Sonny was – down a hallway that seemed to have grown since the last time they’d been through here.

“Sonny…” Clay tried to get his attention.

“We’re going upstairs,” Sonny ground out. He staggered, bumped into the back of Clay’s wheelchair, into the stitches. It was a glancing blow, unintentional but Clay clutched his armrests to stop himself from doubling over. His air whistled out between his teeth.

“Sonny…” Clay blinked away the wetness collecting at the corners of his eyes.

“Of all the…” Sonny grunted as he stumbled. The wheelchair stalled. Clay set his jaw.

“Sonny…” Clay tried again.

“We. Are.” The wheelchair jittered as it caught on Sonny’s cast. He grunted. “Going. Up – “

Clay pointed to a partially opened door on his right. “That room looks empty.”

The wheelchair squeaked when Sonny abruptly turned it to the right.

***

‘Men,’ Lisa though for probably the tenth time today, ‘Are dumb.’

“I see it, but I don’t believe it,” Jason grumbled. He folded his arms across his chest and scowled into the room.

Lisa sniffed. She slanted a look to Jason and Ray and wondered how unbecoming it would be for her to gloat. She nodded towards the two beds.

“I told you,” she murmured, “You two should have told the medical teams to put them in the same room.”

Lisa was right, of course, but as stubborn as men usually were, she knew these two would never admit it. Only Trent had agreed with her. When both Jason and Ray approached him after it was discovered that both Clay and Sonny were missing, he merely smirked, tucked his hands into his pockets and said that he had a report to write for Blackburn. Lisa though she heard him whistling as he walked past her with a wink.

“I should have had the doc sedate him with something stronger,” Ray grumbled. He waved at them with a disgruntled look on his face. “We have hospital staff looking all over and here they are.”

The wayward SEALs currently occupied a room originally though empty. Sonny Quinn was asleep on top of the blankets, his casted leg propped up by pillows, arms all askew and dangling off the sides of the bed, his crutches a messy pair discarded on the floor.

Clay Spenser was a bit more neatly arranged, which Lisa suspected was thanks to Sonny. He slept on his stomach, one arm folded and pillowing his face, the other neatly placed by his side. Only the thin sheet was drawn up to his shoulder, the heavier cover tucked around his legs to avoid the stitches Lisa could see through the open flap of his hospital gown.

“We better call the doctors and get gurney’s in here,” Jason sighed, giving up trying to understand. It had been too long of a day, of a mission going to shit and fighting to keep two brothers alive and intact, to wrap his head around anything.

Lisa looked at the pair, their heads turned slightly towards each other, as if they had been talking and fell asleep mid-sentence. She spied the wheelchair angled towards Clay so he could transfer over easily and the pillows Sonny had under his leg while Clay suspiciously only had one.

“Leave them here,” Lisa found herself saying. “Have the nurses transfer everything to this room.”

“In the maternity ward?” Jason blurted out in disbelief.

Lisa snickered. “They couldn’t find a room for both together. Well, here we do.” When the two SEALs shared a look, Lisa rolled her eyes. “Look, all anyone does on the maternity ward is sleep. It’ll be perfect.”

Ray made a face. “Yeah, but – “Something caught his attention and without warning, dropped to a crouch.

Jason wasn’t fast enough. A pillow smacked him in the face. His arms did a little flail as he tried to stay upright.

“Quiet,” Clay yawned. He dropped his head wearily to the bed. “We’re sleeping.”

“No, we’re not,” Sonny spoke up with a bigger yawn. He sat up and gave them all a shit-eating grin.

Jason scrubbed his mouth with the back of his hand.

“What are you two doing here?” Jason demanded although any anger that should have been there wasn’t. He held the pillow with both hands, looking sorely tempted to throw it and if he threw it towards Lisa, she was going to be real sure not to miss when she threw it back.

Ray scowled at the pair. “Why aren’t you two in your rooms?”

The two blinked at each other, then their waiting teammates.

“Gravity,” the two chorused together.

Okay…

Jason held up a hand. “Never mind, I don’t want to know. We’ll get everything set up in here. Stay put.”

“Not going anywhere,” Clay mumbled into his arm.

Jason really looked like he wanted to throw the pillow. He grumbled, passed it to Ray who wisely just handed it over to Lisa.

Lisa bit back a grin as she turned to leave when Clay cleared his throat, “Hey Davis?”

Lisa paused and glanced over her shoulder. Blue eyes and a lopsided grin gazed back at her.

“Uh… could I have my pillow back?” Clay asked in a meek voice.

Lisa hugged the pillow to her. “Sure thing, Clay.” She went to a tiny closet that every room had and grabbed an extra pillow and new pillowcases. She switched out the old covering and eased one under Clay’s head. She grimaced at the barely audible hiss.

“Just let me do all the work, okay? I’m going to slip this one under your stomach, so your back doesn’t arch as much, alright?” Lisa murmured. She settled a hand on a spot between the stitches on his shoulder and lower back. She frowned when he just nodded. Nope, an obedient Clay Spenser was never a good sign.

“They’re bringing down your IV and morphine pump,” Lisa whispered. “But it might take a few minutes. How about I get you a cooling blanket for your back in the meantime?” She could feel the heat through the thin sheet.

Clay shook his head carefully. His hand curled on either side of his head.

“I’m good,” Clay yawned. He exhaled softly, eyes fluttering closed as he rested a cheek on the pillow Lisa slipped under him. “I’m fine.”

“Of course, you are,” Lisa hushed. “You were fine enough to walk through the hospital with your gown wide open in the back.”

Clay’s right arm twitched as if reaching behind him. Lisa chuckled and patted the back of his head. She waited until his breathing evened out before her hand drifted to his forehead. The cool skin reassured her.

“ISR update, Havoc,” Clay mumbled out thickly.

“Sure thing, Bravo 6,” Lisa whispered. She rested a hand on the back of his neck, a thumb rubbing circles on the spot where his hairline ended until Clay settled down.

Lisa turned back to his roommate and frowned mildly at the glazed blue eyes that greeted her.

“You should be asleep, too,” Lisa scolded as she approached the bed. Sonny tracked her wordlessly. When she reached the bedrails, his eyes flicked towards Clay.

“No fever,” Lisa assured him, and Sonny relaxed, his shoulders slumping. He slid down the bed an inch and she wondered if anyone had bothered to tell him that the whole time, he was downstairs.

“His back?” Sonny croaked. “They said they took him to the OR.”

“Some of the cuts looked deep. The doctor was worried they may have penetrated but none of them did.” Lisa tugged the blankets out from under his legs.

Sonny exhaled. “He didn’t tell me how bad he was hurt before,” Sonny whispered, his gaze back on his brother.

“Like you didn’t tell him about your broken ankle or that you swallowed some water?” Lisa returned. At Sonny’s crooked grin, Lisa scoffed. “Uh huh.” Men.

Sonny obediently sank deeper into his bed and watched sleepily as Lisa pulled the covers up.

“Your IV will be here soon with your pain meds. You missed your antibiotics before so you’re taking the next round, they’re bringing to you. Got it, mister?” Lisa said seriously, looking him in the eye.

Sonny gave her a crooked grin that made her wonder if he had been taking lessons from Clay. Lisa shook her head, rearranged the pillows so his leg was elevated properly and made him to sit up higher.

“Better in case you start coughing,” Lisa murmured as she tucked the other pillow behind his back. “The doctor will want to take another look at your lungs tomorrow.”

“Alright.” Sonny didn’t argue but did minute waving with his hands in a polite shooing gesture at her. “We’re fine, Lisa. Unless you want to give me a sponge bath.”

Lisa just rolled her eyes and ignored the suggestion. Setting her hands on her hips, she inquired, “Gravity, huh?”

Sonny shrugged. He didn’t try to explain, and Lisa didn’t want to understand. She patted his cast carefully.

“I’ll let everyone on the team know you two are…” Lisa grinned broadly. “… In the maternity ward now.” At Sonny’s sigh, she chuckled. “Think you two can stay put and get some rest now?

Sonny’s expression sobered and he stared back at her with a steady gaze.

Another pat on his cast. “Good.” Lisa closed the door carefully behind her. She made a mental note to tell Trent to come and check on them in a couple of hours.

The two stayed up on the fifth floor, being as perfect as patients as those two could be.

Until Brock somehow convinced the floor nurse to bring in warmed baby bottles with their lunch trays.


End file.
